[Sussex] Strange grub behaviour

[Stephen Williams]

On Sun, 2005-05-15 at 19:38 +0100, John D. wrote:
> Rupert Swarbrick wrote:
> 
> >> I'm getting the same reply about it not seeing the /dev/hda3 as the root
> >> block device.
> >>
> >> So, I've then unmerged grub and emerged lilo just in case I'm being
> >> really blind about something.
> >>
> >> I've then "done the usual's" and when I reboot, I get the lilo options
> >> screen fine, but when I boot the 2.6.11-gentoo-r8 kernel I'm just
> >> getting the same reply.
> >
> >
> > Could you send us exactly what the error message is? It might be that
> > someone on the list recognises it, or we might be able to find it in the
> > kernel sources to find exactly what causes the kernel to complain.
> >
> > The good news is that the only problem is in the kernel, and that's
> > usually not too hard to fix.
> >
> > Rupert
> >
> > P.S. I am shooting in the dark a little, as I've never used the gentoo
> > build system (can someone else help here??), although I've played quite
> > a bit with kernel compilation when getting software suspend to work on
> > the laptop (I reckon ~25 different compiles to get the flipping options
> > right!)
> >
> Oakey Doakey,
> 
> the "error" is as follows:
> 
> >> Block device /dev/hda3 is not a valid root device...
> >> The root block device is unspecified or not detected.
>        Please specify a device to boot, or "Shell" for a shell..
> 

This suggests that you've got the wrong root= entry in grub.conf, or
there's a problem with filesystem or ide chipset support. I know you've
been using genkernel, but there really is no substitute for doing it
manually.


> boot () ::
> 
> and that's the lot, it then just sits there and will do nothing else.
> Thats the same error message irrespective of whether I use grub or lilo.
> 
> regards
> 
> John D.
> 
> p.s. erm also could someone remind me how I make the system start in a
> GUI mode? I've set the inittab at 5, the boot dialogue says it's
> starting at run level 5 but then just drops me into a CLI login.
> 

This suggests you've got a problem with your Xorg configuration. Have a
look in /var/log/Xorg.0.log to see if there are any errors raised.

> 

Rather than enter a long e-mail conversation, perhaps you'd like to
bring your box up to Bramber one evening so we can sort it out John.

Steve W.

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